Baby book about being non-binary

[Trysbutfails]

I really genuinely try to understand and empathise with gender ideology but things just keep coming along that are baffling and infuriating to me.

My latest “what the hell?” moment was stumbling across a book called “Bye Bye Binary” - it’s a book apparently aimed at new parents / young children (it’s a classic colourful baby board book).

The book is about challenging binary ways of thinking about being a boy or a girl (“I’m nobodies little princess, or little heartbreaker”) which could have been a really progressive book about challenging gender stereotypes. But instead the thrust is about being non-binary (“He or she?” “What’s it to ya, they don’t need to be either - besides we are letting them see for themselves one day”).

All the examples used in the book involve classic gender stereotypes (pink or blue, dolls or dinosaurs etc) with the implication being that not having a preference for one or other of these suggests you are non-binary….(and by implication that to be a girl you should like pink and dolls, and to be a boy you should like dinosaurs and the colour blue)

It really troubles me to see the issue painted in such reductive terms, especially when it’s aimed at young children.

It seems to me that the message of this book is great. That kids can pick whatever gender they want. And that they can play with whatever toys / wear whatever clothes they want. I don’t think it comes across that not conforming to gender stereotypes means your non-binary; just that if you are non-binary it doesn’t matter.

That kids can pick whatever gender they want

But reality.

@Hermittrismegistus illuminate me

What a shame its not about breaking down gender stereotypes.

Everyone is non binary. Nobody conforms utterly to all the stereotypes for their sex. There is no need to 'choose a gender'. You just like what you like (which has no bearing on your sex).

illuminate me

<waves wand> Lumos!

Don't have kids problem solved. It's still free to get contraception in the UK - a copper coil lasts 10 years

Or just have kids, and don't force fashionable adult obsessions on them.

'fashionable' - how sexism adapts in order to survive. Women still aren't in charge or even remotely equal so that approach does not appear to be working

Wouldn't it be better to teach kids they can have whatever personality they want instead?

Clothes, toys, hobbies, let them choose whatever?

Choosing your own "gender" as a kid means the potential for a medical pathway. The next book will have to find a cutesy way of talking about surgery to get an "outie" vagina fixed.

It's fascinating when people can't see how insanely regressive this shit is

I grew up in the 80s and that was the message I received - that you can wear what you like etc! Agree it's incredibly sexist not to mention homophobic.....it's so sad anyone believes that they can't just express themselves

My Body Is Me does this in a lovely way. Great illustrations too.

Gender is a load of nonsense.

Sexism exists. So dress your baby in whatever colours you want, give little girls cars to play with and don’t freak out when your toddler boy wants a baby doll. Duh.

Better yet, don't have kids at all...they fuck you up

How weird that this suddenly got a bunch of replies months after the original post.

It’s just reminded my all over again how exasperating I found the book!

What does "picking whatever gender they want" involve?

Does the book explain what the chuff a gender actually is?

The message that gender is sexist bollocks, and that whether a kid is a girl or a boy is about biology not personality, is a much healthier one.

I LOVE My Body is Me and so did my littlest.

Hard to believe the author was bullied relentlessly - by other authors!! - simply because she believes in accepting non conforming kids' personalities as they are, rather than medicalising their bodies and compelling the speech of others.

It's a really odd idea to teach kids - that they can choose whether to be male or female. They can't! That's not the way to challenge gender stereotypes. It's actually reinforcing them (girls are princesses, etc.).

There is a huge trend on social justice issues being inserted into board books now. Ibram Kendi's book has a board book version.

At first I thought it was meant to be tongue in cheek, but I've since decided it's a money grab. So far all the ones I've seen are shit stories, and babies and toddlers certainly don't find them interesting.

This has reminded me, I need to get My Body is Me for a toddler relation’s Xmas present. She’ll love it.

Hey parents, conduct a novel social experiment on your child by ungrounding their very sense of self.

Absolutely nuts. And sexist. If you like bows and dolls, you're a 'she'.

Kids can like anything.

Yeah I can't see why they would, tbh.

One of my two year old's favourite books is Peepo, which I like because even though it's set in post-war Britain it shows the whole family pulling their weight with housework and childcare. I like how it shows the dad being an equal parent. To me that's way more progressive and much less contrived.

It's by Janet and Allan Ahlberg, whose daughter Jessica (depicted as a cartoon baby on the back cover of Peepo) illustrated My Body Is Me.

Nuts indeed.

I once encountered (in a local Facebook group) a woman who described herself as a non binary person raising two non binary children.

I asked her what that meant and she said they would be able to choose whether to be a boy or a girl or stay non binary when they were older. So I said, "Righhhhht. And what do they think they will be choosing between? What do they think a boy is, and what do they think a girl is, and what do they think non binary is?"

She didn't get the line of questioning so they I said, "When I was a young child I understood that a boy was a child with a willy and a girl was a child without a willy. It would never have occurred to me that you could choose which one to be because you either have a willy or you don't. But obviously that's not what you're teaching your children about the difference between boys and girls. So what are you teaching them? What do they believe each of those things is?"

She called me a fucking creep for talking about children's genitals and blocked me. The group admin then deleted my posts and said that if I was transphobic again I would be removed from the group. I left of my own accord because I thought they were clearly completely mental.

Peepo is beautiful. It was clearly written and illustrated by people who understood babies. It reflects that baby's world back to it - just like a good mother, nursery worker or therapist might. Little details, like the baby hand holding the back of the mum's apron as they climb the stairs, are timeless.